Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Human rights NGOs, and their half-hearted, belated, and weasel-worded condemnations of rocket attacks

Human rights organisations are supposed to advance a universal approach,
according to which every person in entitled to certain rights and liberties,
based simply on his or her humanity. The most basic of these rights is the
right to life. Yet time after time those very same organisations prove that
some humans - those from groups they personally identify or sympathise with -
have more rights than others. Most recently, this double-standard was evident
in the response by various human rights organisations to the ongoing rocket and
mortar attacks from Gaza on Israeli cities and towns. In between 'code red'
sirens, you could almost hear the silence of human rights organisations.

International human rights lawyer Arsen Ostrovsky ('Israel
Bombarded by Rockets, Human Rights Watch Nowhere in Sight,' 14.11.2012)
pointed out at the beginning of the current escalation, that despite ongoing
rocket and missile attacks on Israeli civilians from Gaza, which greatly
increased in 2012, Human Rights Watch (HRW) continuously failed to issue
condemnations of this unequivocal war crime.

Prior to the current escalation, some 850 rockets and mortars landed in
Israel, since the start of the year. Each and every one of them was launched
intentionally at civilians- children in schools and kindergartens, mums and
dads on their way to work, elderly in their homes, students at universities,
and farmers working on their land. Each one of those rockets and mortars was a
violation of international humanitarian law. Israel repeatedly complained about
them to UN Security Council and the UN Secretary-General (see here
the full list of letters sent to the UN regarding rocket attacks from Gaza).
And still, as Ostrovsky wrote:

"Although the mission statement of HRW might begin with their pledge to
be '... protecting the human rights of people around the world,' when it comes
to the human rights of Israelis, HRW is nowhere in sight."

He also points out that over periods of intense rocket attacks from Gaza
earlier this year, HRW was not silent on the Middle East. They still had time
to issue condemnations of Israel on other matters, such as settlements.

One day after Ostrovsky's article was published, after days of intensified
shelling from Gaza, HRW finally issued
a statement, calling for both sides to "avoid harm to civilians":

"Israeli
forces and Palestinian armed groups in Gaza need to take all feasible
precautions to minimize harm to civilians as hostilities between the two sides
intensify.

Palestinian rocket attacks into civilian areas violate the laws of war
prohibition against targeting civilians, and Israel should ensure it is only
targeting military objects, Human Rights Watch said[...]
'Israeli and Palestinian forces alike need to make all feasible efforts to
avoid harming civilians,' said Joe Stork, deputy Middle East director at Human
Rights Watch. 'There is no justification for Palestinian armed groups
unlawfully launching rockets at Israeli population centers.'

Ignoring the intensifying shelling from Gaza for weeks, months and years,
was a troubling policy. Only commenting on this phenomenon in the context of an
active armed conflict between Hamas and Israel, and waiting until the comment
could include both sides, seems like suspicious timing.

Still, this could have been seen as a small step in the right direction.
After all, HRW usually disproportionally criticises and condemns Israel, and
here not only do they at least attempt to appear balanced by calling on both
sides to not harm civilians, they even refer to the illegality of Hamas'
attacks. But of course, instead it had to feature moral equivalence between
terrorists' rockets aimed to harm civilians and the IDF defensive acts
attempting to target rocket launchers, arsenals (hidden in densely populated
residential areas) and launching pads. Furthermore, HRW's version of the
sequence of events leading to the escalation clearly places the blame on
Israel:

"Hostilities between Palestinian armed groups and Israel have escalated
since an Israeli military incursion on November 8 that left a 13-year-old
Palestinian boy dead, followed by a Palestinian attack on an Israeli military
vehicle on November 10. Between November 10 and 15 armed groups have fired more
than 200 rockets into Israel, injuring eight Israeli civilians, and strikes by
Israeli forces wounded scores of civilians in Gaza."

Later in the report, they reiterate this misleading sequence of events.

The exact sequence of events of November 8 are actually unclear, but what is
crystal clear is that the violence that day began when Gaza militants attacked
an Israeli patrol, leading to an exchange of fire, not when the boy was killed
in unclear circumstances.Official statements by the US, Canada, Britain, and
Australia have all pointed to Hamas attacks and shelling as the cause of
escalation.

The rest of the statement reveals the absolute biases of HRW, as it is clear
that the point of the press release is to point the finger at Israel, concealed
by the appearance of balance in the first few lines of the statement. After
subtly blaming Israel for "starting it," and issuing a routine, blasé
statement about Hamas attacks being illegal, HRW go on to place most of the
responsibility for violation of human rights on Israel:

"The
laws of war require forces to take all feasible precautions to ensure that
attacks are only carried out against military targets, not civilians, and
attacks should be canceled if it becomes apparent the target is not military.
It is unlawful to carry out an attack in which the expected civilian loss is
disproportionate to the anticipated military gain.
'Israeli forces attacking Palestinian armed groups cannot ignore the presence
of civilians, including those seeking to help wounded fighters,' Stork said.
'The high number of civilians wounded in the November 10 Israeli counter-attack
[when Israel responded to a anti-tank missile attack on a patrol jeep] also
raises concerns that it was unlawfully disproportionate.'"

In other words, according to HRW's skewed interpretation of international
law, proportionality depends not on the nature of the target (military target,
as opposed to targeting civilians), the severity of the threat or the means
used to eliminate this threat, but on a cynical "casualty count".
According to this interpretation, it would seem that Israel is not allowed to
attack rocket-launching sites when civilians might be present. Since terrorists
intentionally operate in Gaza from within highly dense residential areas,
around schools, hospitals, and even mosques, that means in effect that,
according to HRW, Israel is not allowed to act against any military target in
Gaza in protection of its own citizens.

Even when Palestinian violation of human rights are mentioned, HRW's
approach is puzzling:

"One
Palestinian armed group, the Popular Resistance Committee, said on November 10
that it had launched four rockets at Israeli communities close to Gaza as a
‘revenge invoice' for the deadly Israeli shelling. Islamic Jihad's military
wing, the al-Quds Brigades, said it fired 13 rockets toward the city of
Ashkelon. Individuals responsible for attacks that deliberately or recklessly
target civilians, or that cannot distinguish between civilians and military
objectives, are responsible for war crimes.
The websites of several Palestinian armed groups cited the Israeli shelling
that killed four and wounded dozens of other Palestinian civilians as
justification for the rocket attacks. Reprisal attacks against civilians
violate the laws of war, regardless of laws-of-war violations by the other
side."

Firstly, any reference to Palestinian attacks on Israeli targets, even if
deemed illegal, is always framed in the context of so-called initial Israeli
aggression, which is presented as justification for the Palestinian attack.
Secondly, internationally recognised terror organisations are referred to as
"armed groups," and terrorists are referred to as
"individuals" or "fighters," thus downplaying the fact that
those "groups" and "individuals" are intentionally trying
to harm and terrorise civilians, and say so. And isn't that the phenomenon that
the statement was meant to protest against, to begin with? By not treating
terrorist organisations as such, by instead pretending that their open policy
of targeting civilians is solely the responsibility of "individuals"
who order such attacks, HRW is effectively turning a blind eye to an open
policy of deliberate refusal to abide by international humanitarian law.

By doing this, and by drawing severe limitations over legitimate defensive
military acts in protection of Israeli civilians, thus undermining Israel's
right to defend itself, and by drawing the moral equivalence between targeting
civilians and attempting to stop rocket attacks on civilians, HRW's response
undermines its commitment to its own stated values. Under the guise of
"balance" it, once more, exposed its own bias with human rights
principles twisted and adapted to accommodate the open sympathy of most Human
Rights Watch Middle East unit analysts with the Palestinian cause. I doubt that
this is the reaction Ostrovsky was hoping for when he wrote his article.

HRW is not alone. According to an NGO-Monitor
report from November 15, a long list of NGOs, all waving the flag of human
rights and protection of civilians, have failed to point the finger at Hamas or
condemn the rocket and missile attack from Gaza.

Amnesty
International, urged that "All sides must step back from the brink to
protect civilians," (14.11. 2012):

"Israel's
assassination of Ahmad al-Ja'abari, the head of Hamas' military wing has placed
civilians in Gaza and southern Israel at grave risk by re-igniting the armed
conflict there, said Amnesty International... Amnesty International has
gathered evidence that suggests at least two of these [Israeli] attacks, on 8
and 10 November, were indiscriminate and, therefore, in violation of
international humanitarian law."

In other words, Amnesty International, in even less "diplomatic"
words than HRW, places the blame for the escalation on Israel. It even goes
further to accuse Israel of alleged 'indiscriminate attacks'. Moreover, even
more blatantly than HRW, Amnesty greatly undermines Israel's right to defend
itself militarily:

"'The
Israeli military must not carry out further indiscriminate attacks, or attacks
in densely-populated residential areas that will inevitably harm civilians,'
said Harrison."

That's right. According to Amnesty, if Hamas operates from civilian
residential areas, as it does, all Israeli counter-attacks are simply
forbidden.

The Amnesty statement, however, does mention, barely and briefly, rocket
attacks on Israeli civilians by "Palestinian armed groups":

"Palestinian
armed groups fired more than 120 rockets into southern Israel between 10 and 12
November, injuring at least 4 Israeli civilians. Amnesty International condemns
the firing of these rockets - which are not directed at a specific military
objective.
'Palestinian armed groups in Gaza meanwhile must not fire indiscriminate
rockets into Israel. The international community must put pressure on both sides
to fully respect the laws of war and protect civilian lives and property,' said
Harrison."

Biased comments, placing blame on Israel, failing to mention Hamas and
avoiding the word "terrorism" at all costs, were also the approach of
Physicians
for Human Rights-Israel, Oxfam
and many others.

Of course, human rights organisations are not the only ones discriminating
between the rights of Israeli civilians and Palestinian civilians. The United
Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) has also been ignoring the
rights of Israeli civilians, and has been mute on the subject on ongoing rocket
attacks from Gaza. Times of Israel ('Foreign
Ministry slams UN human rights chief for "ringing silence" on Gaza
rocket fire,' 15.11.2012) reports that spokesman Yigal Palmor complained in
a press release titled "Has
the High Commissioner for Human Rights gone mute?" about the fact that
despite more than 800 rockets fired into Israel from Gaza in the past year, the
OHCHR has not issued any condemnations of these attacks:

"The
lives of one million Israelis are threatened, and daily life in southern Israel
has been severely disrupted. Children do not attend school; civilians sleep in
shelters[...] This has been the bitter reality of one-seventh of Israel's
population for the past years.
This terrorist activity is carried out by Hamas and other terrorist
organizations that operate under Hamas protection.
And yet the High Commissioner has gone mute. Not a word of sympathy, not a word
of concern for the violation of the human rights of Israeli citizens. Just a ringing
silence.
Israelis do have human rights. The High Commissioner simply does not care about
them."

Israelis do have human rights. It is about time that human rights
organisations and UN agencies act upon their mandates and missions and pursue
the universality of those rights. Otherwise, they are undermining the very
values they are attempting, at least in theory, to protect and entrench.

FEEDJIT Live Traffic Feed

Copyright Notice

JIW includes excerpts from many sources using their copyright material for the purpose of education and discussion only, and not for profit. We acknowledge and link to our sources.We reserve all rights to our own original material, including the excerpted and edited version of the source material. However you are welcome to use JIW material freely for the purpose of education and discussion only, and not for profit, and provided proper acknowledgement is included.